Man arrested for giving young son rum

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BELLE CHASSE, La., Oct. 29 (UPI) -- A Louisiana man was arrested for allegedly feeding his 2-month-old son enough alcohol to register a .289 percent blood alcohol content, police said.

Belle Chasse resident Cesar Ruiz, 19, was arrested Saturday on attempted murder charges, nearly a week after his son, Lucas Ruiz, was admitted to a pediatric unit at a hospital with breathing difficulties, The (New Orleans) Times-Picayune reported.

Lucas was diagnosed with an undisclosed illness and was scheduled to have surgery this week, but, while undergoing treatment, the child started having seizures and was moved to the pediatric intensive care unit where his elevated blood alcohol level was discovered.

The child's mother, Erika Wigstrom, told detectives that she had noticed that a bottle of Bacardi Silver Rum was missing from her freezer.

Cesar Ruiz initially said he didn't know anything about the missing bottle of rum, but later admitted to taking one of his son's feeding tubes from the hospital home, pouring some of the rum into it and taking it back to the hospital, Jefferson Parish Sheriff's Office spokesman Col. John Fortunato said.

Ruiz told authorities he acted to relieve his son's suffering, and did not mean to kill him, Fortunato said.

The infant's condition is unknown.